As someone who goofed his way into journalism, I have a lot of sympathy for anyone willing to show the series of messes, lies and bluffs that make up getting into the career. Doubly so if they can tell a fascinating story, drizzling atop the enterprise a healthy amount of moxie. With all this sympathy, you’ll find I can forgive a whole lot—even a movie that practically opens up with a trite “yep, that’s me” narration.
The based-on-a-true-story Dabka knows its main character is a dick who thinks he’s better than everyone and everything. I’m inclined to agree with it. That said, Evan Peters’ portrayal of real-life journalist Jay Bahadur is so charismatic he almost runs away with the movie despite its clear intentions towards taking his snotty personality down a notch. And while the half-Indian journalist has been whitewashed by Peters (obviously consulted upon with Bahadur himself), the rest of the film casts (and even meta-critiques) with clear eyes Hollywood’s process of combining or completely erasing accurate portrayals of race and ethnicity from its films. But first: Dabka and Bahadur have to get out of Canada.
Bahadur is a loser. A market researcher obsessed with current events and his journalistic dreams, he’s submitted stories everywhere, only to be rejected. Then, by chance, he meets someone who’s made it. A mentor! Finally, every aspiring writer’s dream!
Surprise, it’s the wild-haired Seymour Tolbin (Al Pacino, who sounds like he ate a bullfrog that had been raised on the chunkiest gravel the pet store could afford) whose advice is as acrid as it is hilarious. “You wanna make it as a big swingin’ dick journalist, you gotta go somewhere crazy,” he says. And Bahadur decides, Hey, Somalia is pretty crazy. So crazy, in fact, that no Western journalists can convince their outlets to insure their travels there to cover its developing piracy situation. A Ukrainian vessel is taken, Tolbin’s advice is taken and then Bahadur is taken…to Somalia. It’s a ride so wild and rapid that it’s hard not to believe, a Hunter S. Thompson-wannabe bout of madness, but rather than a drug-addled freakout, it’s a whirlwind threatening to fling your heart out of your body when a series of exciting life events all tumble by one after another.
Director Bryan Buckley, known for his Super Bowl commercials and Oscar-nominated short film Asad, has plenty of stylistic swagger and a seemingly genuine touch with each of his actors. The leads are perfectly metered, side characters full of depth and one-off extras as deadpan as one could hope. Bahadur’s translator is a man named Abdi played by Barkhad…Abdi. He’s the guy you probably know as a Somali pirate from Captain Phillips, here working with a journalist and his government to pressure the pirates into behaving.